On the drive up through the far northwestern corner of Iowa and into lower Minnesota, we encountered a lot of flooded land, and there were places where the water was almost to Highway 60, so I knew we'd have to find an alternate route home since we drove through rain all the way to Bloomington and there was more rain in the forecast.
We stayed at the Hyatt Regency and immediately learned that it, along with most of the area hotels, had a shuttle service to the Mall of America and to the airport which is virtually next to it. So, we took advantage of the shuttle service and found it to be very useful.
If you haven't been to the Mall of America, it stands four stories high with two hotels connected to it. As a whole, the mall is thriving. The only store going out of business was a Harley-Davidson apparel store, which disappointed me since I own a H-D motorcycle, but aside from that, the other stores were open, and there were a lot of people visiting each day we were there. Granted many of them were likely there for the amusement park in the middle of the mall, the numerous restaurants or the movie theater, but I saw a lot of people shopping as well. Barnes and Noble, one of my favorite stores naturally, was one of the busiest and was the only store in which we had to wait in line for any length of time, but we came away with three more books for me and one for her -- "The Origin of Species" obviously.
During our three visits to the mall, we ate at Wahlburgers, Bubba Gump Shrimp, Hard Rock Cafe, and Rainforest Cafe. Each experience was unique, but I probably preferred Wahlburgers -- perhaps because it was the newest, but mostly because I'm a fan of Donnie on Blue Bloods and Mark in The Italian Job. We learned that this was their 27th restaurant in their franchise and that they had opened it on May 22, 2018, so we just missed seeing them by a few weeks -- ha ha.
I don't do much shopping online. I'm old-school in many ways: I prefer actual books to electronic ones, I prefer writing notes in actual notebooks over taking them on a laptop, and I absolutely must try on clothes and shoes before I buy them, so I am continually dismayed by the number of stores going bankrupt and out of business. Even in a mall the size of the Mall of America, I had a hard time finding clothes that fit me well, but I did finally find the perfect store and attendant for me.
My daughter, who is young and thin, had a much easier time finding things that fit her, but that was as it should be since we went their for her birthday. She came away with a very nice pair of shoes, a jacket, some shirts and a light-up glass from Bubba Gump Shrimp -- she had wanted to eat there on her birthday even though we don't eat seafood!
If you were to ask her about her favorite experience at the mall, though, it would be the two movies we saw there. The first was Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. As I mentioned above, she plans to be a paleontologist, so she loves everything about dinosaurs and animals that lived long ago -- she's currently interning at an active dig site, so she's getting valuable hands-on learning that will serve her well. She (and I) especially liked the movie theater for its recliner seats. While she enjoyed the entire movie, I spent a good deal of it covering my eyes every time a certain evil genetically created dinosaur was eating people. Ugh. We also watched Incredibles 2 -- I never had to look away during that movie! (In the photo below, we arrived early; the theater did fill up, but it wasn't packed.)
We drove to downtown Saint Paul to visit the Science Museum of Minnesota. I picked a Saturday when I wouldn't have to deal with the traffic of many people going to work, and that was a wise decision since I missed the tiny entrance to the parking garage -- twice! If you enter off Kellogg Street, which is where the main entrance to the museum is, and you miss the parking garage entrance, you have to go around a few blocks bordered by one-streets to get back to it. Then if you miss it a second time, as I did, flip a U-ie even though there is a sign telling you not to. You can do this on a Saturday when there isn't much traffic. Ha ha.
The museum is right next to the Mississippi River, and it has grand views overlooking the river.
The museum is a very hands-on museum with all kinds of learning activities and interactive scientific things. I'm not into science at all, but even I enjoyed it. At one station, I attempted to write my name in such a way that it would appear correctly in a mirror. This was to simulate how much brain power it takes for small children to first learn how to write. Personally, I remember learning to write as being much easier than trying to write my name on that block so that it would appear normal in the mirror!
The paleontology section was pretty nice, and there were a number of things on display that were originally found in Nebraska. As scientists learn more about ancient life, the information about that life changes, so my daughter was a bit disgusted to see one of the placards still referred to dinosaurs as reptiles. However, the displays were set up well, and the other information was educational and interesting.
Aside from the great hands-on activities and the paleontological stuff, the museum has a tug boat on one of its decks, a GIANT astronaut and a room full of Legos that you can use to build things while admiring the scale models of important buildings from around the world formed completely out of Legos!
This was just a short trip to these two places in honor of my daughter's birthday, but they both were worth the time we spent at them. Hopefully, just as real books have not died off even though they were predicted to do so with the advent of e-readers, I would like to see malls and real stores see a comeback once the current craze and surge of online shopping dies down. If that happens, then the Mall of America will be there for many more years. I'd like to return someday to visit more of the stores I simply didn't have time to get to on this trip and maybe to ride the zip-line across the amusement park. Ha ha -- no way will that one ever happen!
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